The Only Way To Cure Regret
by girl with the green ipod
Summary: It was sudden, unexpected, heartbreaking and it crushed me.' Edward left Bella without much in the way of an explanation. When they are reunited will things return to how they were or are some things just too broken to be mended?


**Well, I started a new story, please tell me what you think of it :)**** I know where it's going but I don't exactly have a detailed plan. Enjoy :)**

**Also, if you're going to listen to the song, I recommend youtubing for the 'Kindred Spirits' version. They were my friend's choir and I much prefer their version to Celine Dion's.**

**This was like 3 pages on Word, so I'm just gonna pretend that it looks as long here as it does there :)**

**Disclaimer: You all know I'm not Stephenie Meyer and as such, Twilight is not mine. Damn and blast...**

Chapter 1: Because You Loved Me

_You gave me wings and made me fly,_

_You touched my hand, I could touch the sky._

_I lost my faith, you gave it back to me,_

_You said no star was out of reach._

_You stood by me and I stood tall,_

_I had your love, I had it all._

_I'm grateful for each day you gave me._

_Maybe I don't know that much,_

_but I know this much is true,_

_I was blessed because I was loved by you._

_(Because You Loved Me by Celine Dion)_

It was midway through junior year when it happened. It was sudden, unexpected, heartbreaking and it crushed me.

It changed me in so many ways and made me a shadow of my former self. The Bella that existed then still exists now, but she is buried underneath all the heartache and pain. I've shoved her down and blocked her off so that she can't be hurt again. I don't think she'd survive that; there are only so many times that one's heart can be torn in two before it just gives up the ghost. And the wounds that Edward had inflicted on me were so deep that they threatened to overpower me at any minute and send me back into myself and make me into a person that I wouldn't recognise. Mine were the wounds that time could not heal, the wounds that hurt a little more with every second that passed.

For months afterwards I was merely a shell; a body with no soul, no heart, nothing. I was empty. The sparkle in my eyes had dulled, the mischievousness in my grin had disappeared, for I had no reason to smile. And, worst of all, the butterflies that resided in my heart, making it flutter and misbehave whenever he was around, had died, rendering my heart useless, one shell inside another.

I questioned myself relentlessly; "How could I have let myself get so involved?" " How could I be this crushed?" " What did I do wrong?" "Is it down to me that the 'Six Musketeers' are down to five?" "Why could I not just pull myself together and move on?"

This went on for weeks, until I realised that he did love me and he cared for me and looked after me that I had forged a bond with him that couldn't be broken by distance or time, we had given and taken to and from the other so much that we were linked like no two people ever before. I was so in love with him that I knew I could never even look at a man in the same way as I look at Edward. There was just no way that anybody could ever be half the man that he was in my eyes. Not when he loved me like he did. He was my rock, my strength, he spoke for me when I couldn't do it for myself and he always saw the good in me, even when I couldn't see it myself. He gave me everything, he gave me hope and he gave me faith, he gave me love and he gave me life. He brought me out of myself, showed me that I could do anything I set my mind to, all because he had faith in me when I couldn't trust myself enough to make the jump. He taught me the meaning of blind faith and showed me the rewards that can be reaped if we can just trust ourselves enough to place our hopes in the hands of another. I didn't have a choice about loving him. We were meant to be, fated to happen. But apparently we were also doomed to end.

They say a circle has no beginning and no end and life is a circle. But what about love? Does that ever end? I don't think so, love for another person isn't something that can be taken lightly. It is powerful and all-encompassing, and something that strong can't just cease to be. But what happens when the love is there but the people are gone, the circumstances changed, the course disrupted? They say that the course of true love never did run smooth and this is the sentiment that got me through the days, months and years that I spent alone. I clung to the idea that what we shared was true and that, one day, sooner or later, Edward would return to me and explain to me why he left me that day two years ago.

I can still recall that day with perfect clarity.

He asked me to come back to his apartment, telling me that he had something important to talk to me about. I remember the blank look in his eyes, the look that told me something was up. But I couldn't say no to Edward, I had learnt that from the very first moment when I met him, and so I followed him home to meet my fate.

I won't go into details about the conversation that entailed, just know that it involved many tears being shed and many refusals, on my part, to accept what was happening. Edward was moving to New York to be closer to his family. He was going to finish out his course in NYU and arrangements had already been made for his transfer. There was no going back now, what was done was done. He was leaving at the end of the semester.

The song changed and Linkin Park was blaring out of the speakers. I wasn't able to recognise it any further than that as they weren't, and still aren't, my cup of tea, but I remember Edward glaring at his iPod as if it had offended him somehow by playing this song. I stood there for a moment, just drinking in what I knew would be my last Edward-filled seconds for a long time and he eventually looked up at me, tears streaming down his face the same way they were down mine, silently but deadly. With each tear that fell I died a little more inside, and I knew he was feeling the same thing as me because when he ran his hand through his gorgeous bronze hair, his movements were robotic and lacked his usual aplomb, and when he looked me in the eyes, his once startling emerald green eyes had frozen over, lost their depth and darkened, and not in the way that told me I was getting lucky tonight. And, when he whispered my name, his voice, instead of being soothing, liquid gold and oh so sexy, was husky, hoarse and rough. It was flat yet there was so much emotion behind the utterance and his voice caught as he tried to hold back the sobs that threatened to overwhelm him. I knew right then that he was just as dead as I was, he too was a shell, I had too much of his heart and he too much of mine for us to function without the other.

I couldn't take any more and so I turned on my heel and left. Just walked out and left him there. I closed the door behind me and just sank to the floor with my head in my hands, waiting for Ashton Kutcher to pop out and tell me I had been Punk'd, because this couldn't be real. Me and Edward were in this for the long haul. But then I heard the noise that smashed through my denial and convinced me that it was over. I heard Edward cry. He was sobbing uncontrollably and I longed to comfort him, but I knew I couldn't. And so I got up off the floor, dusted myself off and walked back to my dorm to cry in peace in a ball under my duvet.

Eventually, with the help of Rosalie, Alice, Emmett and Jasper I resurfaced, pulled myself together and now I'm where I am today. He made me into a better person and that didn't change when he left, it just me a while to realise that life goes on and I will have to at least make the effort to get on with my life. I had dated a few men at the insistence of Rose and Alice, nothing serious though, it rarely made it past the 3rd date and never past the front door, but I'm content in being alone.

I still live with Rose and Alice, although we are joined by Jasper and Emmett practically every night seeing as they live in an apartment only three floors up from us. The girls are great in that they know when it's time to leave me alone with my thoughts and when it's time to crack open the Merlot to drown our sorrows.

We seem to be doing that a lot recently, drowning our sorrows in copious amounts of alcohol, and we each have our own reasons for doing so. For me, it's the absence of Edward from my life. For Rose, it's the rough patch she and Emmett are going through. And for Alice, it's the extended separation from Jasper whilst he's on his book tour.

I remember when Jasper first left about a month ago and Alice would speak to him every two or three days and she'd come off the phone all happy and cheerful. I had asked her how she managed to be so relaxed and happy when he was on the other side of the country. She told me that she knew her and Jasper would be together forever, they were two halves of the same whole, and that when she knew that they had the rest of their lives, what was a month in the grand scheme of things?

Her response has stuck with me since then, and given me fresh hope that one day Edward will return and we will have the rest of our lives to spend with one another.

Jasper returns in two weeks after his last stop of New York and it just so happens that the date he returns will be the third anniversary of Edward's departure. And with three being the magic number, who's to say what might happen?

**What do you think? Press the green button, cause you know you want to :D **

**More coming soon... assuming life doesn't get in the way :)**


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